Menon, who launched aboard the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-29 spacecraft in July, pointed out his room, which “doubles as a voting booth,” for all intents and purposes. 

“Inside is my computer, where I was able to fill out an electronic form, and send it to Harris County,” he said, while floating inside the laboratory. (Harris County is home to NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center.)

Menon’s fellow U.S. crewmembers—Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney, who launched to the ISS via a SpaceX rocket last month—were also able to vote.

Like any other Americans who will be away from home, astronauts are able to fill out a Federal Post Card Application to request an absentee ballot. 

Once an astronaut fills out an electronic ballot aboard the ISS, the document “flows through NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System to a ground antenna” at a test facility, according to a NASA description shared in 2024.

From there, the votes are then sent to Mission Control Center in Houston, Texas, and then on to the relevant county clerk responsible for handling the individual ballot. To ensure privacy, the ballot is encrypted and can only be accessed by the astronaut and county clerk.